What Happens When Trump Dials Back the Crazy?

His TV ads, at least, have become more “presidential.” But highlighting the saner side of Trump risks diluting his brand.

May 6, 2016

In early
January, Donald Trump rolled out his first televised campaign ad in Iowa and New Hampshire. It introduced
his blanket ban on Muslims entering the United States with footage of airport
security lines, the San Bernardino shooters, immigrants scurrying across the
border from Mexico, and an eerie aerial shot from a drone. “He’ll quickly cut
the head off ISIS,” the narrator said. “And
take their oil.”

Even at a time
when many Republican candidateswere
stoking fears about immigrants in their ads, this one was unusual. Traditionally,
candidates use their first TV spots to introduce themselves to voters in the
most flattering way. Early ads aired last year for Marco Rubio and Rick Perry were classic examples. “My father was grateful for the work he
had, but that was not the life he wanted for his children,” Rubio said from behind a brightly lit podium. “He wanted all the
dreams he once had for himself to come true for us.” Perry used a similar story
about his humble roots to introduce himself to Iowans. “In a farmhouse with no
indoor plumbing, a boy named Rick Perry learned lessons of strength,
resilience, and faith,” the narrator said,as idyllic vistas of dusty rural
Texas flash by.

Trump, true to form,
eschewed their examples in his first ad. As NBC’s Perry Bacon Jr. wrote at the time, “He could have used his first ad to emphasize
his business successes, his family or his policy plans on cutting taxes and
improving health care for veterans, less controversial issues. Trump didn’t
take the safe course.”

Trump’s latest television ads could not be more conventional—or, frankly, more boring.

Steering clear
of the “safe course” has fueled Trump’s campaign all along—and now it’s boosted
him to the Republican nomination. But his erratic, “I’ll say anything” persona
could be more of a liability than a boon in the general election. In the coming
months, Hillary Clinton and her allies will do everything in their power to
paint Trump as dangerously unhinged. They got started on Wednesday, just hours after Ted
Cruz abandoned the race and cleared the way for Trump to become the nominee, releasing
a witty, highly shareable video that shows prominent Republicans like Mitt Romney calling
him a “con artist,” “phony,” “bully,” and “the most vulgar person to ever
aspire to the presidency.”

Trump needs to
show that he has a softer and more rational side, and he’s been assuring
supporters—and skeptical Republicans—that he can, and will. But there’s a
hitch, as he well knows: The more Trump sounds like a traditional politician,
the more he risks losing the fervent support of people who like him because he’s
anything but a traditional
politician.

Trump is clearly
conflicted about all this. Two weeks ago, at a rally in a Connecticut
gymnasium, he addressed the reports that he was planning to become a more decorous, disciplined
figure on the campaign trail. “I can do presidential, folks. Believe me,” Trump
told the crowd that had gathered in Waterbury. But then he
straightened his shoulders, gazed mockingly into the distance, and told the
truth: “I sort of don’t like toning it down.”

Since then, Trump
has continued to ridicule his rivals on the campaign trail. “In the case of Lyin’ Ted Cruz. Lyin’ Ted. Lies. Ooh, he lies. You know Ted. He brings the Bible, holds it high, puts it down, lies,” Trump said
at a rally in Indianapolis late last month. But he has begun to tone it down in his
campaign ads. The television spots Trump rolled out in Indiana this past week,
prior to the primary win that clinched his nomination, could not have been more
conventional—or, frankly, more boring.

The first shows Trump in his Manhattan office, with skyscrapers
looming in the background and traffic inching along on the street below. “We’ll cut taxes for the middle class, negotiate new
trade deals, bring back jobs, save Social Security and Medicare without cuts,
end illegal immigration, build the wall, strengthen our military, knock out
ISIS, and take care of our great veterans,” Trump says as upbeat music swells
behind him. “We’re going to make America great again.”

Granted,
Manhattan is an unconventional backdrop for a political ad. As I wrote several weeks
ago, politicians most often use New York City as a symbol for corporate greed and excess. But otherwise, the Trump spot is straight out
of a mainstream playbook: He’s one more politician talking directly and soberly to the camera for a
full 30 seconds.

His second ad presents the softer side of Trump—sort
of—with his eldest son talking adoringly about his dad. “Growing up, my brother, sister, and I had to really
know what we were talking about before bringing him any kind of proposal,”
Donald Trump Jr. says as the commercial cuts to a photo of his father smooching one
of his grandsons. “He may be a little less tough on his grandchildren right
now, but it’s that toughness that I want renegotiating trade deals with China
and Mexico. It’s that toughness that I want keeping me and my family and your
family safe.”

These ads may go
a little way toward dispelling the notion that Trump is an egomaniacal tyrant who
should never be trusted with the nuclear codes. Progress! But they also dilute the persona Trump has built up for
himself—as an outsider who eschews political orthodoxy and the Washington
cartel—because they employ the same tactics that conventional politicians have
been using for years.

It’s easy to see
why the Trump campaign is trying to steer in a “safer” direction. How, after
all, does he woo the skeptical voters he’ll need to beat Clinton without
convincing them that he can be at least reasonably “presidential”? But if the
Indiana ads signal the campaign’s strategy going forward, there’s a risk that
it could backfire—and not just because he may lose fervent supporters who like
the unhinged, non-traditional version of Trump.

Throughout the
campaign so far, Trump has had an almost supernatural ability to deflect
criticism on the campaign trail, because he could say: I’m a Washington outsider. Naturally, the Republican elite is going to
gang up on me. Just ignore them. They’re lying, like all politicians. But the
more he adopts the mainstream Washington playbook in his ads—and in the rest of his campaign—the more he looks
like a political insider himself. That’s when he has to watch out, because that
will make him just as susceptible to criticism as the average politician.

THIS WEEK’S ADS:

Most of the new ads that aired this week were in Indiana, as Ted Cruz mounted a last-ditch effort to stop Donald Trump before Tuesday’s primary. Below, we’ve analyzed fournew ads that aired this week. You can see every presidential campaign ad that’s run during this cycle at the New Republic’s2016 Campaign Ad Archive.

Ted Cruz: “Coin” and “Same”

Type: Attack ads

Who Paid for It? The Cruz campaign

Reach: Aired in Indiana

Impact: Of all the attacks thrown at Donald Trump over the course of this election, these two ads are perhaps the most outlandish: The Cruz campaign claims that Trump and Hillary Clinton are “two big government liberals,” with the same positions on everything from gun control to raising taxes. “Coin” and “Same” are perfect examples of ads—Like Jeb Bush’s “Vane” and John Kasich’s “Muddier”—that latch on to a metaphor and take the imagery just slightly too far. Not only are Clinton and Trump “two sides of the
same coin,” but they areactually on
a coin, together, looking like glowering Roman emperors.

Ted Cruz: “Pence for Cruz”

Type: Endorsement ad

Who Paid for It? The Cruz campaign

Reach: Aired in Indiana

Impact: In any other election cycle, a popular Republican
governor of Indiana stepping in at the eleventh hour to endorse a candidate—in this case, Ted Cruz—in a
televised ad might have had an impact. But Republican voters seem to have decided
they want an outsider as their nominee. Calling in an elected Republican
official to endorse Cruz only aligned the Texas senator more firmly with political
insiders. It’s the same problem Marco Rubio faced back in early March, when one of
his last campaign ads featured Arkansas Governor Asa Hutchinson telling voters, “It’s time to
unite behind the conservative who will win in November. That’s why I am
endorsing Marco Rubio.”

Ted Cruz: “Lying”

Type: Attack ad

Who Paid for It? The Cruz campaign

Reach: Aired in Indiana

Impact: This spot punches back at Donald Trump after the media mogul released an ad last week claiming that Cruz “voted for Obama’s job-killing trade bill” and “supported amnesty for 11 million illegals and would have welcomed more Syrian refugees.” In “Lying,” the announcer tries to set the
record straight, saying, “Cruz voted against TPA and is fighting to stop TPP.”But given that ads focused on arcane policy points have
failed to rebuff Trump’s outlandish claims throughout this election cycle, this ad, like all
the others, was likely doomed to fail from the start.